Empire of the Sun

I was talking to someone the other day and they mentioned that if I liked MGMT (which I do!), I should check Australian band Empire of the Sun. So I did.

You should too.


Empire of the Sun, "Walking On A Dream" from Benjamin Technology on Vimeo.

Good People, Good Vibes, Bad Name, Good Song

Just chatted with my friend Chioke this morning for the first time in ages. In addition to being the headless star of TV On The Radio's "Dancing Choose" video he is also an all-round quality dude. He passed along a lot of good vibes in our chat and he topped it off by sending along this great song/video.

Check it!


Starfucker - Rawnald Gregory Erickson The Second from epb21 on Vimeo.

More on Starfucker (yes, they need a new name)

OK Sounds Good Best of 08'

,

Yo, 2008 was a great year for music!


Flying Lotus- Los Angeles
Erykah Badu- New Amerykah
Cut Copy- In Ghost Colours
Hercules and Love Affair- s/t
Jose James- The Dreamer
Benga- Diary of An Afro Warrior
C.R.A.C.- The Piece Talks
The Beat Konducta(Madlib)- Dil Cosby Beat Konducta 5
Lemonade- s/t
Raphael Saadiq- The Way I See It
Portishead- Third
MGMT- Oracular Spectacular
Black Milk- Tronic
Jackson Conti- Sujinho
Santogold- s/t



Best Mixtapes......
Diplo and Santogold- Top Rankin
Madlib- Speto da Rua
Wale- Mixtape About Nothing

Best tracks...
Termanology feat Bun B (prod by DJ Premier)- This Is How We Rock
Erykah Badu- Soldier
Benga- 26 Basslines- Wind yo waste to the wobbly leg dance in the mirror for hours with this chune on repeat!!
Estelle- American Boy
Exile- In Love
Moodymann- Freeki Mutha fucka
Busy Signal- Tic Toc (rmx) feat. Rye Rye and MIA - tic tic tic toc!!!! body grind!
Samiyam- Moon Shoes- Swing yo chain to this!!!
Illa J- All Good - Words of wisdom and inspiration with throwback Dilla beats as a backdrop: "thats the past dont remind me..." / "by the way , this is for souls with a purpose..." yeeeeeeahhhh!
Hercules and Love Affair- Blind - Ridiculous production!!! When the guitars and horns come in near the end, its like the sky opening up- I cant feel my face dawg!
Big Boi feat Raekwon & Andre 3000 - Royal Flush
Flying Lotus- Interference

Honorable Mentions:
Q Tip- The Renaissance
Menahan Street Band- Make the Road By Walking
Quiet Village- Silent Movie
J Davey-The Beauty in Distortion/ The Land of the Lost

RIP Eartha Kitt

The Legendary Singer and Actress Eartha Kitt Passes On


"I do not have an act. I just do Eartha Kitt ... I want to be whoever Eartha Kitt is until the gods take me wherever they take me."


Wow, I got chills just watching this.

Best Ofs - 2008 (Camille's favorite albums)

This was tough to do. I'm still kinda uncertain....so I'm not explaining anything. Check out the tags, we've written up most of these artists in the past.

Camille's Top Ten Albums of 2008

1. Babyshambles – Shotter's Nation
2. Black Milk - Tronic
   
3. Erykah Badu – New Amerykah
4. Janelle Monae- Suite
   
5. Jose James – The Dreamer
6. Jamie Lidell – Jim
7. Raphael Saadiq - The Way I See It
   
8. Beck - Modern Guilt
9. Flying Lotus - Los Angeles
10. Daedelus - Love To Make Music To
    

Photocredits: 1,2,3,4,5,6,8,9,10

Best Ofs - 2008 (Camille's favorite songs)

I've been reading everyone's Best Of lists for weeks now and churning mine out in my head. So I figure now is a good time to start hammering them out.

Here are Camille's ten favorite songs of the year in no particular order (with corresponding videos/links):

1. Exile - In Love (actually I think this is my hands down favorite song of the year. so simple and earnest. i usually have to listen to this song two times in a row, at least)




2. Erykah Badu - Healer





The Healer/Hip Hop - Erykah Badu


3. Sam Sparro - American Boy (cover of Estelle track done on BBC)




4. Hercules & Love Affair - Blind (bringing disco house BACK. i MUST see this group live)




5. Jose James - Park Bench People


6. Santogold - Starstruck (Diplo Remix)




7. Jamie Liddell - Little Bit of Feel Good


8. Erykah Badu - Soldier
(this album is HEAT and the TRUTH)



9. Janelle Monae - Violet Stars Happy Hunting




10. Joel Alme - The Queen's Corner

Daniel Merriweather - Change

So as far as I can tell, Daniel Merriweather's album is a definite go for the new year. I've heard about four tracks of the album and there's finally a video for one of them; I figure this is the lead-off single here, Change. This track is not exactly my favorite thing, but I love me some Wale and Daniel Merriweather is one of the mostly solidly talented and goodhearted dudes I've ever met, so I'm hoping all this will chart and everyone will be happy and rich and nice and invite me to dinner sometime.

Gilles Peterson(GP) rundown - 12/11/08

Super chill show this week, not much jumped out at me sadly, but I did get a shot out from GP at the end of the show! Nice to be noticed. :) Anyway here are a few choice cuts from the show:

mama! milk – ‘The Moon’ (Windbell)- great band from Japan that GP has been pupping for months. They will be at Worldwide Awards, I'm considering being there too....

Aaron Parks – ‘Nemesis’ (Blue Note)
Erik Truffaz – ‘Come Together’ (Blue Note)- Blue Note is still putting out crazy good stuff. As GP mentioned, the label will be 50 years old next year and they are putting younger labels to SHAME.

Sabu Martinez & Sahib Shihab – ‘Nus’ (Swedish Radio Recordings) - interesting rare recording from a brief collaboration on Sweden

Onra from All City 7 x 7 series

French producer Onra finishes up the All City Records 7 inch series with a boom, which is to say he kills this track!

Check out "My Comet" here

Prince crashes Q tip show

The ever elusive Prince decided to crash Q-tip's performance in Vegas a couple weeks ago. Here goes some footage- I'm sure this will be taken down from youtube by Prince's handlers so catch it while you can.